The Points Guy’s Nick Ewen Has 28 Credit Cards. Here’s How He Tracks His Benefits

Americans carry four credit cards on average, according to credit reporting agency Experian. That would make Nick Ewen anything but average. According to his biography on The Points Guy, he has 23 open and active cards.

“I need to update that,” Ewen said. As of February, “it’s actually 28.”

Ewen’s job as senior editorial director at The Points Guy is to help consumers get the most out of the benefits dangled by their credit cards, and he leads by example. Over the last two decades, he’s vacationed in 50 countries (and every state in the union) by using his accumulated miles, credits, and points, with little out-of-pocket costs.

Depending on how you look at it, Ewen is both a luxury credit card issuer’s dream—he’s a loyal and reliable customer—and a nightmare. He really does use each and every one of those perks on offer, a skill that would probably cause issuers a lot of anxiety if all of their cardholders got this good at it.

Ewen’s proficiency with plastic raises a key question: As credit cards—especially the metal ones—offer more and more benefits, how does he keep track of them all?

“A lot of it does live in my head,” he said, “but I have a spreadsheet. I have monthly calendar reminders that pop up around the 15th of every month with a list of perks that I have to use.”

Nowadays, more and more of those perks come with restrictions. But Ewen has factored those in, too. “The challenge is that some of these cards have made benefits a monthly or quarterly thing,” he said, “so my January reminder looks different than my March reminder.”

Among the tactics in Ewen’s playbook is taking out multiple cards from the same issuer to accumulate rewards more efficiently. For example, in addition to Chase’s Sapphire Reserve card, he also has two Chase Freedom cards. “Right now, those cards give me five points per dollar on dining,” he explained. “By combining these together, I can pool my points much quicker.”

Consumers like Ewen are sometimes called “credit enthusiasts,” and he’s hardly the most eccentric of the lot. A man in India named Manish Dhameja holds the Guinness world record for the largest portfolio of active credit cards: 1,638.

Of course, what Ewen does isn’t for everyone—or even for most people.

“If someone is able to pay their bills in full, on time, every month,” he said, “most people will be perfectly well off with having one or maybe two cards.”